THE BISHOP OF NATAL'S SERMONS.* As a refutation of the
Bishop of Oxford's reckless charge that all who went to hear the Bishop of Natal were inclined to Infidelity or open Atheism, the publication of this volume is timely enough. Any one who reads it will be sure, without investigating the opinions of the individual members of the Bishop's audience, that neither Atheist nor Infidel would take the slightest pleasure in listening to sermons of this nature. They are not very orthodox sermons, indeed, and are deficient in their exposition of the meaning of the Christian revelation, even as we understand it ; but they are full of the deepest piety and spiritual feeling, of profound faith in God and love for Christ, and would be regarded as mere diluted ortho- doxy by the class of people amongst whom the Bishop of Oxford's correspondent classified the larger number of the Bishop's hearers. They contain more piety, more faith, more candour, and more courage than nine out of every ten episcopal sermons that one reads, and of teaching that we should regard as false there is but little, though now and then there is an absence of what we hold to be the key-truth to the Bishop's subject, that strikes us as an indication, not indeed of any great Christian faith abandoned, but of a certain suspense of mind on some of the greatest of theological subjects, owing to the powerful influence exerted over the Bishop's mind by the sudden inroad of new convictions. He teaches explicitly, openly, and we think most wisely, though perhaps with needless and sometimes inopportune iteration, the doctrine of the fallibility of the Scriptures, and his polemic against the mere prostration of the intellect in deference to miraculous evidence is sound and often acute. But so far as this volume gives us any key to the Bishop's conception of the Christian revelation, we might almost take it as consisting in the more rapid development, under the personal influence of God acting on the conscience and reason of chosen servants, of truths rooted essentially in that con- science and reason, though needing time and discipline to be brought to light. This of course is a part, and a great part, of divine revelation, but we doubt if it is the greatest part, and we are far from saying that the Bishop of Natal so believes it. But it is certainly true that in his reaction against the doctrine of external authority, he at present limits himself almost exclusively to impressing on his people that God teaches them in the Bible what the conscience and reason might teach us without apostles
• Natal Sermons. A series of discourses preached in the Cathedral Church of St. Peter'e, litaritzburg. By the Right Rev. JohnWilliam Coleus°, D.D., Bishop of Natal. London: irtibuer.
and prophets to hasten the discovery. Take, for example, the following, from the sermon on "Perfect through Suffering (p 28) :—
" Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness ; for they shall be filled!" Blessed are the merciful ; for they shall obtain mercy !"Blessed are the pure in heart ; for they shall see God V 'Blessed are the peacemakers ; for they shall be called the children or God !' Are these words true, merely because they are written in the- Bible, or merely because they were spoken by the Lord Jesus Christ himself? Are they not felt at once by us to be essentially, eternally true? Would they not be just as certainly trim, wheresoever they were written, by whomsoever they were spoken ? Do we not know that they are among those words which 'shall never pass away '—which we, human beings, in our best estate—we who are all, by the great work of God's redeeming Love, made children of God, yea, sons and daughters. of the Lord Almighty= brethren' of Christ, as the text says, for both he that sanctifieth,' that is, Christ, 'and they that are sanctified,' that is, the human race, the children whose flesh and blood He shared, are all of One,'—are not, I say, such words as these among those which, by the unanimous verdict of the human mind, in its best and holiest- moments, we bind on earth, and they shall be bound in heaven?' I repeat, then, such as these are the words of life which we find in the, Bible abundantly, on almost every page—not the mere statements of Scripture writers in respect of matters of Science or History—about which they were left to the ordinary sources of human information, and fell into the common mistakes, or adopted the current notions of their- own times."
Now, this is true, but it seems to us to leave out of view—we do. not mean to deny—the centre of the Christian revelation, and even that element in it which has chiefly fitted it to impress the. human conscience and human reason,—the record, namely, of divine actions, no less than of divine thoughts. Dr. Colenso is. anxiousto keep our eyes on those aspects of the Christian faitls which are independent of history. But the entrance of the Son of God into human history is, unfortunately, if true at all, a fact or history, and yet, though an historical fact, a fact more calculated,. —as all actions as distinguished from sayings and thoughts are,— to impress the human reason and conscience than all the divine sayings of our Lord put together without this act. Here, then,. we have something in revelation which we could not believe, and should not feel any right to believe, without historical evidence,. and which yet, if believed on historical evidence, carries with it, more spiritual momentum,—adds more to the moral and spiritual force of our Lord's words and human actions, to the light thrown, upon the mind and character of God, than any words, however divine, or any merely human acts, however full of moral and spiri- tual beauty, could give without it. Just as we say of men that their words are beautiful and true, but what we want to know,. before we can thoroughly believe in them, is their actions,—so, in all reverence, men must say, and whether they say or not,
will think, of God. This is all very fine,' they will think, and no doubt very true, about God's inspiring all the best thoughts and best actions of men ; but there will always be a diffi- culty in saying what is inspired and what springs out of a man's. own character ; besides, if we had to inspire another, we might tell him nothing but what was pure and noble, and yet not be willing to do it ourselves. What we want to know is, what is- God in Himself ? Will He suffer, if it is necessary, to extirpate sin ? Will He sacrifice Himself for us as He wills that we should do for Him? If not, His life and character are not sharply enougla defined to give regeneration to human society.' Now, the answer to this question is not purely spiritual or moral ; it is historical.. And we take it, that on the true answer to it the future of Chris- tian Churches depends. If we accept the Incarnation, the question is answered, and a great historical Church rooted in God. If not, we lapse into pious and noble rationalism, as pious and as noble as you please, but still without any of the same root in God's. personality and action as the Incarnation gives us. It is natural enough that the Bishop of Natal, in the necessity of defending his. position as to the fallibility of Scripture, should omit to bring out fully the historical aide of our Church's faith. And though we notice the deficiency in his sermons, we do not in the least intend to charge him with having abandoned the central fact of the Christian theology.
Not to dwell too much on Dr. Colenso's omissions, we may say that there is much beautiful, noble, and thoroughly Christian teaching in these sermons. Especially the sermons on the Com- munion are full of fine teaching nobly expressed. This, for instance, in answer to those who are superstitious enough to believe they in- crease their spiritual responsibility by joining in the sacramental service, is put with great reality and vigour :—
" And let us remember also, that we cannot avoid the responsibility of feeding on this Living Bread, by abstaining altogether from coming to the Holy Table. For we incur it whenever we hear the Living Word, and His Voice reaches the heart, and comes home to the con- science, and the call is made upon us by the Divine Lord of the sod to receive and obey that truth which we hear. Then will it be seen whether we are true living men' true disciples of Christ, true children of God, or not,—when the flesh and blood of Christ is poured into our ears,' as St. Jerome says, and we either devoutly feed on this spiritual food, eating and drinking Eternal Life, or lightly heed or disregard it. But so, too, neither can we be deprived of this privilege by any cir- cumstances of our own position, or by any acts of our fellow-men. We may be living, more especially in a country like this, far away from the appointed minister and the means of grace. But, if we feed by faith on the Living Word of God,—if the Spirit of Christ dwells in our hearts, by faith, and love, and obedience, and conformity to His life and death,'—then, as Bishop Jeremy Taylor says, we do every day communicate,' and no earthly circumstances, no earthly power, can deprive us of this."
How thoroughly Christian is the Bishop of Natal's spirit, and how excessively unlikely is a recent rumour that he excommunicated, or intended to excommunicate even, the hostile party which, without any authority, elected a bishop in his place, the following paragraph will sufficiently prove:— •
" That Feast, which should have been the brightest light upon our path, as the sign of our love to one another and of God's love to us all, has been made to cast the darkest shadow. At this moment, as we know, the three great bodies of European Christians, the Greek Church, the Roman Church, and the English Church, have no communion with each other. And in England itself there are large Christian societies which do not communicate with one another. While here also, as we know, in South Africa, the threat of excommunication has been launched against any who shall not have been guilty of immorality of life, or have even avowed great differences in religions opinions, but shall simply have taken a different view as to their duty under certain circumstances. But let us, my brethren, not so 'learn Christ.' Lot us welcome to our fellowship all who love Him,—all who love God and who love man,— whatever their shades of opinion may be. If the laws of our Church do not yet allow free access to the Table of the Lord, for all such as these, if they will,—for all who are 'pure in heart," meek," merciful,"peace- makers," hungering and thirsting after righteousness,'—for all whom Christ himself pronounced to be blessed,'—let us confess this to be a blot in our system, a stain upon our feasts of charity ; and let us do our bests as time and opportunity shall serve, to help towards a better state of things than this—one more in accordance with the will of our Lord. But let us each, individually, seek to be 'in charity with all,'—above all, with such as these, whom God our Father assuredly holds in His embrace, whatever our earthly differences of creed may be."
The style of these sermons is, not unnaturally, hasty. There are many great imperfections of form in them, especially an undue tendency, no matter what the subject, to diverge into proof of the fallibility of the Bible, apropos sometimes of hothing ; but allowing for all these imperfections, and what we hold as the greater imperfection of the omission above discussed, there are but few living Bishops of the English Church who have published anything so real, so earnest, so manly
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